Doesn't help the Tri-athlete cause

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  • dennisn
    dennisn Posts: 10,601
    Bo Duke wrote:
    It's a real shame you have such a poor opinion of such a broad spectrum of superb athletes and insist on pressing your opinion on everyone.

    You press your opinion and I press mine. What's the big deal? :?
  • Paul 8v
    Paul 8v Posts: 5,458
    This is Dennis' new Lance thread!

    I think the original point was triathletes can be known to dress like pratts (And we know the reasons why) Finishing an ironman is an achievement anyone could be proud of though
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  • dennisn
    dennisn Posts: 10,601
    Paul 8v wrote:

    I think the original point was triathletes can be known to dress like pratts (And we know the reasons why) Finishing an ironman is an achievement anyone could be proud of though

    I think finishing or not finishing an athletic endeavor is not not really the achievement or non-achievement. The achievement or not is the training that you did to enable or not enable you to finish. Finishing the Ironman is a sort of forgone conclusion IF you did the training and preparation. If you didn't then finishing may not be in your future.
    Pride in finishing? Sure. That's what it's all about. Unless of course you're looking to me to be impressed by you. No. I believe people need to do these things for themselves. To feel good about themselves. Not to expect others to react with awe and joy or fawn over you at the mere mention of the word Ironman.

    As an afterthought, why do they dress that way? :?
  • cougie
    cougie Posts: 22,512
    Some people boast. Some people dont.
    Youre only hearing about the ones that boast Dennis. The others dont feel the need to tell you about it.

    I like bike racing. Triathlon is just easier to get into for the average person.

    As for it not being competitive ? It is in certain segments of the field. You may have a couple of thousand racing - they wont all be competitive - but more in numbers than youd get in any one bike race.
  • DeVlaeminck
    DeVlaeminck Posts: 9,104
    Triathletes do have more of a tendency to overstate things whereas cyclists tend to understate them. I suppose it depends which you prefer. A cyclist can see a triathlete as bragging about nothing whilst a triathlete can view a cyclist as a miserable bugger who can't enjoy life. Triathletes might congratulate each other for finishing an event whilst a cyclist would question why someone would even sprint if they are outside the points. There are exceptions to the rule on both sides of course and I think it's breaking down as more people come into cycling but those tendencies do linger on.
    [Castle Donington Ladies FC - going up in '22]
  • morstar
    morstar Posts: 6,190
    Why are triathlons being compared to crits anyway when they are more akin to time trials. A triathlon is a race against the clock of varying lengths with hugely varying degrees of ability participating.
    A road race is a fairly unique event where if you have a certain level of fitness compared to your competitors, you can do very little and finish in the bunch due to drafting. As an athletic endeavour, bunch racing isn't really comparable to most sports. Tactics, teamwork and sprinting ability have a huge influence.
  • Bo Duke
    Bo Duke Posts: 1,058
    dennisn wrote:
    Bo Duke wrote:
    It's a real shame you have such a poor opinion of such a broad spectrum of superb athletes and insist on pressing your opinion on everyone.

    You press your opinion and I press mine. What's the big deal? :?

    I am not forcing my views on this forum unlike yourself who preaches in generalisations that triathletes are boasters. To me, this smacks of someone who doesn't understand the demands of triathlon or the characters involved.

    Three quick examples: 1. My next door neighbour who got bored of ironman races and is now an ultra marathon runner running 100 mile cross country races across some of the most ridiculous hills imaginable. He runs 30k before going to work. 2. The lad I chatted to whilst swimming in the sea - did Cairns Ironman 2 weeks back and had run for 1.1/2 hours yesterday morning and was swimming a quick 3k to loosen up. 3. A mate of mine in the US, another ironman who trains upto 3 times a day whilst holding down a top management job. When we meet to discuss 'business' we talk training tips, feeding strategies etc.. for 90 minutes and never get round to discuss business.

    These fellas don't boast, they tell you straight what they've done. When you train 2-3 times a day getting up at 4am to start, boasting is not on the menu. Walter Mitty's don't last long in this company. I greatly admire the same people you don't understand because you can't imagine their level of commitment.
    'Performance analysis and Froome not being clean was a media driven story. I haven’t heard one guy in the peloton say a negative thing about Froome, and I haven’t heard a single person in the peloton suggest Froome isn’t clean.' TSP
  • ai_1
    ai_1 Posts: 3,060
    morstar wrote:
    Why are triathlons being compared to crits anyway when they are more akin to time trials. A triathlon is a race against the clock of varying lengths with hugely varying degrees of ability participating.
    A road race is a fairly unique event where if you have a certain level of fitness compared to your competitors, you can do very little and finish in the bunch due to drafting. As an athletic endeavour, bunch racing isn't really comparable to most sports. Tactics, teamwork and sprinting ability have a huge influence.
    He compared them in an attempt to support a ridiculously unfair assertion, not because it makes sense or is constructive in any way. If you don't spot the glaring errors in equating crits with triathlon races it almost seems like Dennis has a point...but he doesn't. He's spent the last few pages of this thread trying to justify what appears to be no more than a prejudice. If it's more than a prejudice, he's not doing a good job of making his case....IMO
  • woody1545
    woody1545 Posts: 322
    Remember when this thread used to be fun?
  • ai_1
    ai_1 Posts: 3,060
    woody1545 wrote:
    Remember when this thread used to be fun?
    For who?
  • woody1545
    woody1545 Posts: 322
    People who like laughing at videos of others falling over and photo's of them looking silly, which is pretty much everyone. Before it descended into pointless stereotyping (and photos of Lance in speedos :shock: !)
  • Pross
    Pross Posts: 43,462
    woody1545 wrote:
    Remember when this thread used to be fun?

    Yep. Can someone post a link to the word 'banter' in the OED please?
  • greg66_tri_v2.0
    greg66_tri_v2.0 Posts: 7,172
    dennisn wrote:
    I think finishing or not finishing an athletic endeavor is not not really the achievement or non-achievement. The achievement or not is the training that you did to enable or not enable you to finish. Finishing the Ironman is a sort of forgone conclusion IF you did the training and preparation. If you didn't then finishing may not be in your future.
    Pride in finishing? Sure. That's what it's all about. Unless of course you're looking to me to be impressed by you. No. I believe people need to do these things for themselves. To feel good about themselves. Not to expect others to react with awe and joy or fawn over you at the mere mention of the word Ironman.

    As an afterthought, why do they dress that way? :?

    So much hate, dude, so much hate...

    Some of what you say is right. Do the training and finishing an Ironman isn't that hard (although you can get a panic attack or a kick to the face in the water, crash, puncture, trip, cramp or bonk, any of which can leave you sitting out the rest of the day). Or, looked at this way, if you take 2 hours to breaststroke the swim, and 8.5h to pootle the bike, you've still got 6.5 h left to walk the marathon course. But that isn't what most people aim for...

    I'm puzzled as to why you would expect someone who's done one or more Ironman races to expect awe, or joy, or fawning. Bad experience in your past? Who knows. Personally, I don't give a monkey's what people think, not least because I have no idea whether they don't have an athletic bone in their body or race IM in under 8 hours.

    I'm even more puzzled as to why you seem to think that pride in an achievement is, in and of itself, worthless, or worse, a bad thing. How many people ride, say, the Marmotte or the Etape, just to say they've done it? Or run a marathon? Would you really say to someone contemplating their first such event: "if you're doing it just to prove to yourself that you can, don't bother. In fact, unless you're going to be competitive, don't bother."? You can't really think that everyone who turns up to race a crit is there to try to win it, can you? There'll be a large group who know that they have no chance of winning whatsoever, but are there just to participate, improve, and learn.

    FWIW, as a matter of general perception I'd say triathletes are pretty welcoming to newcomers - I suspect because having to do three sports means you start badly at at least two, and that engenders some humility. Roadies, OTOH, again as a matter of general perception, are often right up their own arses, principally along the "you're not good enough to be riding that frame/gruppo/wheels/powermeter" variety.

    As for the dressing up part, I can only say that if you think that cyclists dress normally, you've already wandered further from the herd than you realise. It's all relative... :D
    Swim. Bike. Run. Yeah. That's what I used to do.

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  • Art Vandelay
    Art Vandelay Posts: 1,982
    woody1545 wrote:
    People who like laughing at videos of others falling over and photo's of them looking silly, which is pretty much everyone. Before it descended into pointless stereotyping (and photos of Lance in speedos :shock: !)

    Agreed. This is a good one:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EcqIgCJNjto
  • DeVlaeminck
    DeVlaeminck Posts: 9,104
    Greg66 Tri v2.0 wrote:
    So much hate, dude, so much hate...

    .... Roadies, OTOH, again as a matter of general perception, are often right up their own arses

    Yeah right that's a nice balance post isn't it.
    [Castle Donington Ladies FC - going up in '22]

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